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The bleeding had stopped on her arm, and Pirra felt thankful that it had only been a small piece of shrapnel rather than the actual bullet.
The man had only been ten meters away. If he’d taken even a moment to aim carefully, he could have shot her dead with ease.
That he hadn’t spoke either to his panic or his desire; he might not have wanted to kill her. Or even hurt her.
She was missing too many puzzle pieces to solve this riddle. She needed more information.
Her system was now telling her that she’d only been here six hours, but it seemed to change at intervals one way or the other. Looking back, she was seeing a pattern emerging; the initial changes seemed to line up with the blackouts they’d been having – though she hadn’t felt that for awhile.
But the system insisting they were on a date years in the past seemed to be coming more and more often. Whatever was causing these errors was accelerating.
After escaping from the gunman, she’d gone into a compartment that had once been crew quarters. The first had been sealed, from the inside, and she hadn’t had time to force it. The next one had been unlocked, and that’s where she had gone in.
To her surprise, the personal effects of the person were still here. She knew that this place had been evacuated years ago. In Response circles it had generally been considered to be the best idea the top brass had had with regards to the place.
It took either a colossaly dutiful, mad, or suicidal person to have taken a post here, had been the general consensus. Rumor had been that the station hadn’t even been given an armory, on the fear that they might use the weapons on themselves.
Now, she realized, the people they’d seen on here all seemed to fit that description.
They had been evacuated, though. At least, there had been no one left on the station. She had seen a medical training film by a doctor who had been on this station, Halla Crube, and she’d seemed fine. An expert in tenkionic medicine. Her videos were a primer for all Response personnel.
This room hadn’t been Crube’s, though. The clothes were for a man, and at least a few sizes larger.
The medical kit in here had come in handy, even if it was just a standard issue kit. She attached it to her belt with a universal connector and looked around. There could be something else useful in here, and it seemed to have been undisturbed for years, judging by the stale smell her antenna picked up.
Opening drawers, she saw personal knick-nacks. Nothing useful. In another drawer, though, she found a small pen knife, which she pocketed.
Closing the drawer, she was about to leave, but caught sight of a pad half under the bed. Kneeling, she grabbed it and powered it on. It didn’t even ask for a passcode.
Had the owner wanted for it to be found? She glanced carefully through the data, not connecting her system to it in case of a trap.
It seemed entirely normal, though; just a man’s personal log.
In fact, his logs were still on it.
Her heart beat faster. There might be a treasure trove of data here.
The logs were locked, but that wouldn’t be an impediment. The man’s private information was vital to her mission, and she felt no guilt in accessing them. She’d just have to risk connecting her system to it.
For a moment, she got an error; mis-matched security data was keeping her system from connecting. It was more of a risk to override that, but before she could even order it the connection suddenly clicked.
“Show me the personal logs,” she ordered. “Emergency Override Aleph-Gamma-Omicron.”
Other Terrestrial 